Intro
Content Marketing is a crucial part of any digital marketing strategy and we can’t see that changing anytime soon.
In fact, we think content marketing is as important as it’s ever been and so knowing what tools you can use to make it work for you is more essential than ever.
Now a bit of honesty from us: there are plenty of lists out there that give some great recommendations for Content Marketing tools (take a look at this huge one for starters) – this is by no means an original idea – but we felt that it was time this subject was given a bit of a refresh.
So, we decided to pull together 40 tools that we either use here at SiteVisibility or have been given very good recommendations from our network and partners into one easy to read resource.
We’ve broken the tools down into 5 simple categories depending on where in your Content Marketing efforts they’ll come in handy.
These categories are:
- Research
- Ideation
- Creation
- Marketing
- Measurement
So, without further ado, let’s delve into the top 40 content marketing tools to make your job easier, starting with those that you can use for your research…
2. Research
1. Google’s Keyword Planner
Although part of the Google Ads suite, Google’s Keyword Planner isn’t just for paid advertising.
It’s also (usually) the first port of call when carrying out any kind of keyword research as it’s the ideal tool for gathering first glimpse data about keyword search volumes and to generate and find new keyword ideas.
This research can then be expanded on with other tools, but for most content marketers, this is generally the place to start to generate initial keyword ideas.
It’s 100% free to use and you’re able see how each keyword is likely to perform with historical statistics and traffic forecasts to help you choose the keywords you want to use for your campaigns.
To use the tool, you’ll need a Google Ads account but it’s easy to set one up in just a few minutes.
2. SEMrush Keyword Magic Tool
The SEMrush Keyword Magic Tool is one of our favourites for finding a treasure trove of additional keywords off the back of a single seed keyword.
It’s great for finding additional content ideas, synonyms, related keywords and other areas for content consideration.
What’s more, it’s useful for organic keywords as well as for creating PPC campaigns.
Here are just some of the reasons why we love it:
- You can get over 2 million keyword ideas
- You can use keyword grouping to segment your keywords by topic
- You are able to pick the best keywords and save them in the Keyword Analyzer
- You can create up to 50 target keyword lists
If you’re already using SEMrush in your other marketing efforts (and we recommend that you do), you can also use the Keyword Magic Tool alongside their other tools too.
3. AnswerThePublic
As the guys behind AnswerThePublic say themselves, the tool provides “search insight that could and should be used by any marketing team, creative, PR, Content & SEO”.
Don’t be put off by the slightly scary man that greets you when you land on the site, AnswerThePublic is definitely worth your while.
All you need to do is enter a subject, keyword or phrase and then like Google’s auto-suggest results, the results that you’ll get are real questions that actual people are asking (so you can create the content that answers them) with all the data visually displayed.
The tool is great as it allows you to get a better understanding of your audience and the types of questions that they are asking online. From the back of that you can then create content to answer these questions whilst optimising for long-tail keywords. As a bonus (if you’re lucky) you may ven be able to get your answers into Google’s featured snippets.
It might sound confusing but trust us; soon it’ll be your go-to research tool for helping you to answer the questions that your target audience are asking.
4. Google Trends
Like how Answerthepublic works?
Well, why not get your data straight from the horse’s mouth!
Google Trends has always been a marketer’s friend, and the real-time data means that content creators have the perfect tool to find out what topics are currently hot and craft their content accordingly.
If you’re someone who likes to create timely content (and who doesn’t), you can use the tool to keep up with the latest search trends online and can help you to decide on the topics you want to create content around.
You can also use the tool, to check how a term is currently performing or has been performing over a period of time. For example, say I’m interested in creating content around Craft Beer, I could put the term into Google Trends and check its popularity over the last 5 years:
As you can see, it’s been steadily increasing over the last 5 years and so I’ll know that this is probably a good topic to choose to create content about.
The reverse can be said of something that shows a downward trend.
5. Buzzsumo
Competitor analysis is an essential part of any content creation strategy as it allows you to see what works and what doesn’t without having to spend the time testing it yourself.
Instead, you can see what’s worked for your competitors and tailor your approach accordingly.
Buzzsumo is a great tool for this.
You can simply use the tool to search for a domain and within seconds you are able to see the best performing content for that site in terms of shares & engagements.
If something’s worked particularly well for a competitor, you can ask yourself, could I do this EVEN better? If you can, you’ll stand a good chance of performing well. If not, it might be that the topic is covered enough and you can focus your efforts elsewhere.
With Buzzsumo, you can also just type in a keyword related to the piece of content you plan to create and you’re able to see what’s already out there and how well it’s done.
Either way you use the tool, you are able to see if your content idea has already been done and done well (if so, you may want to have a re-think) or if there’s a gap in the market for the type of content you want to produce.
As an additional bonus, if your undertaking an influencer marketing campaign, you are able to use the tool to easily find key influencers to help you promote your content.
6. Ahrefs Content Explorer
Similar to Buzzsumo, the Ahrefs Content explorer lets you see how well different pieces of content have performed for any particular topic.
However, it provides more than just social and share data, as it also gives data on more ‘SEO-y’ metrics like backlinks, organic traffic, domain rating, and traffic value.
With its advanced search functionality, you are also able to find link building prospects, low competition topics and partnership opportunities for your content marketing campaigns.
The paid versions can be pricey, but if you have the budget it’s absolutely worthwhile to invest in.
7. Moz Keyword Explorer
Moz Keyword Explorer is probably one of our favourite tools for when it comes to keyword research and content idea generation.
With the keyword explorer you are able to search by keyword, root domain, subdomain or page.
When searching by a keyword, you are given keyword suggestions with a number of options for further filtering, providing the perfect starting place to help you with content ideas.
Keyword explorer is also a great tool for uncovering keywords as questions, helping you to find topics that people are looking for answers to.
In addition to keyword insights, you also get a SERP analysis showing you what’s currently ranking for the term as well as a Mentions, showing the latest places across the web where the term is featured.
Check out the benefits of using the Moz Keyword Explorer below:
8. Soovle
Soovle is like the Google Keyword Planner of the ecommerce world.
All you need to do is type in your suggested keyword or topic and you’ll get a combination of the suggestion results from sites like Bing, eBay, Amazon and more. If you’re looking to create content that is more product related, this could be the way to go.
If you’re able to include the suggestions thrown up using Soovle in your content, or create content around the common questions that are coming up, you’ll have more chance of being found by your target audience.
9. Unmetric
A social media analytics tool with a primary focus on competitor analysis, Unmetric can be used at multiple stages within your content marketing strategy, but we find it really useful at the research stage.
Unmetric shows you an easy to use comparison between your content’s performance and your competitor’s.
You can keep an eye on what your competitors are posting and when they are posting it as well as how those posts are performing to help you understand what’s working and what isn’t in your landscape.
It’s also great for spotting gaps in content so you can make sure you’re ahead of your competitors.
3. Ideation
10. Quora
User generated content sites can be a goldmine for content marketers and Quora is no different. In fact, marketers have been using Quora to come up with ideas for years now.
The question site lets you find the questions that people are desperate for answers to in your industry or subject area, allowing you to create the content that provides those answers.
While AnswerThePublic is great for researching specific keyword questions, Quora is ideal for coming up with general themes for content around questions to which people want answers.
As a bonus, once you’ve created your piece of content, Quora can also be a great place to share it (as long as you’re not overly self-promotional).
All you’ll need to do is find relevant questions and help answer them and as a result, if done correctly, you can:
- Get more traffic:
- Get more high-quality traffic
- Boost your authority by showcasing your expertise on a subject
- Learn more about your audience
11. Reddit
Reddit really is a bit of behemoth.
So much so that they claim to be the “Front Page of The Internet”.
Averaging around 150million page views a month, if something is popular online, you can bet it will be featured here.
You are able to browse ‘sub-reddits’ for a variety of topics, find the top posts that are relevant to you and use them to come up with similar content ideas.
Like Quora, you can also use Reddit as a means of sharing your content by answering questions in your field.
Check out this video from Edublogs on how you can use Subreddits:
Again, you’ll need to be careful not to come across as too self-promotional, so only answer questions that are super relevant to you and that make sense to do so.
You’ll need to build up profiles on both platforms before you start promoting your own content. After all, you don’t want to get banned!
12. Growth Hackers
Growth Hackers is a place for marketers to get together and share useful and informative content and therefore a great place to get tips and ideas for your content.
Their blog is community based and so you’ll not only get useful tips and ideas from fellow like-minded marketers, but you’ll get the opportunity to create content as well.
Like Reddit and Quora before, you should only post content that’s relevant and that you feel is going to benefit the community. Before you start, check out their guidelines here.
Our top tip when it comes to Growth Hackers is to make the most of their Growth Studies and discussions and see if your content could benefit from the tips provided.
13. Medium
Though it has a reputation as a place for personal essays and somewhere to promote your content, Medium is a content platform that offers up a lot of useful insight into the types of content that can become ‘viral’ or at least, very popular and can provide a lot of insights from other content marketers.
In terms of ideation, you can browse through the top posts, and if any from your niche stick out, try to ask why and see if you can replicate their blueprint.
If you can’t find any popular posts from your niche, consider using a top post from a different niche as a starting point and see if you could transpose their style to your particular topic.
14. SEMrush Topic Research
Another one of our SEMrush favourites, the Topic Research Tool is part of their wider Content Marketing Toolkit and is a great way to:
- Get content title ideas
- See search volumes
- Get an idea of keyword difficulty
- See existing content that performs well for that term
You’re also able to see the questions that people are asking around your subject by the type of question and the word that it starts with. E.g. what, how, is, which & does.
Simply add a seed idea or keyword and the tool returns a number of ‘Cards’ that can be explored further.
With so much information in one place, the SEMrush Topic Research tool really is a real time saver!
15. Pinterest
Although it’s often used as a key part of a business’s social media strategy, Pinterest is also great for generating content ideas.
Sometimes a visual approach can be more stimulating for ideation than words alone and Pinterest is a great way to tap into that psychology.
There’s already so much content on the platform just waiting to be discovered.
With Pinterest, if you’re stuck for content ideas, you can type in a keyword or subject and straight away you’re given the most searched for topics related to it.
With the above example, you’re able to see results for Content Strategy, Content Ideas, Infographics, Advertising, Tips and more.
What’s more, the images that your shown are also full of tips and advice.
If you’re really starting from scratch, you can even just browse the popular boards and pins to see what types of visual content really excel on the platform. The chances are, if it does well on Pinterest, it will do well elsewhere as well.
4. Creation
16. Visual.ly
Sticking with the visual theme, Content Marketing isn’t just about words on a page. Sometimes the best way to communicate a message is in the form of a graphic or image.
Visual.ly allows you to find graphic designers and freelancers to work with who can make your content ideas come to life, or even come up with ideas on your behalf.
It’s a paid for service, but one that’s really worthwhile if you don’t have the resource to create something visual in-house.
Visual.ly also has a distribution network so once your content has been created, you can also get help promoting it.
17. Gimp
If you’re a bit more creative yourself, why not use Gimp to create or manipulate your own graphics.
Essentially, Gimp is Photoshop for those who can’t stretch to the (substantial) cost. It’s free and easy to use and with tutorials available as well, it’s a graphic design staple.
18. Canva
Like Gimp, Canva is a favourite at SiteVisibility and a great free tool for creating your own images.
You can create images for almost anything from your social media posts and profile images to presentations and flyers. You can use the tool to both help make your content more visually appealing or to create the content itself, such as an infographic.
There are paid for stock images and designs within Canva but if you’re on a budget, you can definitely get by with the free elements.
What’s more, there is even a design school with courses to help you get started.
19. Contently
Contently is the full content marketing solution for lots of medium-sized brands.
Where visual.ly lets you hire and commission freelance graphic designers, Content.ly provides the platform for every aspect of your content creation – from hiring copywriters to strategists to offering a full CMS and analytics dashboard.
If you’ve got the budget, this really is the complete package.
20. KnowledgeVision
Over the years, the internet has become more and more focused on video as a content medium, but the costs of decent video production have remained high.
With KnowledgeVision, video production need not be extortionate.
Essentially, KnowledgeVision is a multimedia software solution that helps brands create videos and interactive content from presentations to videos, for learning or marketing purposes.
It’s an extremely useful package for those who have existing content but are looking for a way to make it more interesting and useful for their audience.
You’re able to create, host & share your visual content through the platform meaning that if you’re looking to create interactive content, it’s the full package.
21. Storify
One problem with having so many popular social media platforms is knowing where the best conversation on a certain topic is happening.
Storify does exactly that.
Storify lets you compile a number of stories on a specific topic that can include conversations from all across the web.
This means you can compile and curate a comprehensive timeline of a particular issue or event, with content from YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and many more, all to be displayed in one central place.
With this functionality, Storify can be a really useful tool if you’re live tweeting or reporting on a story or event as it’s happening.
22. CoSchedule Headline Analyzer
The #1 Free Headline Analyzer (to give it it’s full title) is a fantastic free tool from the team at CoSchedule.
When it comes to creating content, we all know how important a title can be in terms of getting more engagement and click throughs in the search results, and you can make yours snappier, more noticeable, and more effective using the CoSchedule Headline Analyzer.
Simply put your current headline in the box, hit ‘Analyze Now’ and you’ll then get a headline score and advice on a number of different aspects, such as length, word balance, type, sentiment, keywords and more, all with handy advice to help improve it.
If you’ve put the effort into writing a great piece of content, you want it to get noticed and using the headline analyser can really help.
23. Readable
Once you’ve written a great piece of content, you’ll want to make sure that readable! And guess what? Readable helps you with exactly that.
Readable quickly tests the readability, spelling and grammar of your text and shows you where you can be making improvements.
You’ll get a readability grade and at the same time you’ll be shown if there are any instances of long sentences & hard to understand words as well as any writing style issues or text density issues.
It’s a relatively cheap tool with prices starting from $4 per month, and one that can really help you to make the most out of your content.
5. Marketing
24. Mailchimp
G2 Crowd ranked Mailchimp #4 in their Best Software Companies of 2019 and it’s easy to see why.
Giving you the ability to collate lists of email subscribers and create template-based email campaigns full of your content, split test and then analyse your responses and results, this really is a must-use promotional tool for your content.
Saying that, it’s more than just an email marketing platform. It’s also got a whole heap of marketing automation features as well as an advertising platform helping you to make the most of your content.
One way in which we use Mailchimp at SiteVisibility, is to send out automated campaigns to those who’ve downloaded a piece of our content.
For example, for someone who’s downloaded our Ultimate Content Promotion Guide & Checklist and signed up to our email list, we may then send them further automated emails with similar, related content that we think they’ll find useful, like our Podcast with Daniel Daines-Hutt on Why Content Promotion is so Vital or even this blog post!
25. Buffer
One of the more labour-intensive aspects of content promotion is social media sharing.
One post among the noise isn’t going to do a lot, you really need to be posting regularly.
Thankfully, this is where Buffer can help.
You can set it to schedule posts across Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and LinkedIn and be secure in the knowledge that your social media marketing is being taken care of.
Tip: If you’re looking for a free alternative, why not look at Hootsuite.
26. Tweriod
It’s all well and good having a tool to schedule your posts for you, but knowing when to schedule those posts to get optimal reach is just as important.
Tweriod will tell you this.
It analyses your followers and tweets to determine when the best times to send a post are.
Very simple & very useful.
27. BuzzStream
In their own words, BuzzStream “makes outreach a snap”!
The tool combines a database of influencers, powerful search functionality, inbuilt CRM, message/email tracking, the ability to add contacts from your browser, and powerful reporting into one tool.
It also allows multiple people to work on the same campaign with full visibility for everyone.
What’s more, we like the range of pricing plans that make it suitable for everyone from freelancers to large organisations with hundreds of employees, and all those in between!
28. Issuu
Do you create a whole slew of content regularly? Do you kind of wish you could create a tangible, even printed magazine of all this great content?
Well, starting at just $19 per month, Issuu could be the solution for you.
It lets you pull together all the content (images, text, videos and PDFs) you’d like into one single publication that can be distributed on a number of platforms to be read on mobile, tablet and desktop or even printed on demand.
If your content is good enough, you can even make money from the platform by selling single issues or subscriptions of magazines, ebooks and reports. You can also make your content searchable by optimising for Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), the standard for mobile.
We recommend using the free trial and seeing if Issuu can work for you.
29. PRWeb
PR and marketing have always been intrinsically linked, but with content marketing coming to the fore, this link has become even more important.
PRWeb is the perfect tool to make the use of this crossover. It lets you send out press releases to a huge number of journalists and publications with the goal of securing press coverage.
If your content is in any way newsworthy, PRWeb and similar tools are a great way to get a boost.
30. Slideshare
Acquired by LinkedIn in 2012, Slideshare has become a business essential.
Presentations have always been great promotional tools, but their lifespan could often be short. With Slideshare, you can make sure that this isn’t the case. You can upload the slides and notes from your presentation and even those who weren’t there can benefit from your knowledge.
Don’t just take our word for it though, this guide from Neil Patel explains in detail how you can utilise SlideShare in your marketing efforts.
31. Followerwonk
Followerwonk is a difficult tool to categorise as it can be used almost anywhere in the content marketing process. We’ve decided to put it in our promotion section as it can give you a great idea of the leading lights in your niche on Twitter and therefore those to whom you want to publicise your content.
Perfect for influencer marketing as a means of promotion, Followerwonk lets you see a variety of stats for Twitter users and even automatically follow them from within the app.
Another great tool from Moz.
32. IFTTT
IFTTT stands for “If this then that” and basically does what it says on the tin.
It can be set up to do almost anything.
So for example, you can set it so that: If someone follows you on Twitter, then you receive a text. If you publish a blog post, then it’ll be publicised on your Twitter.
The permutations are almost endless, as there are hundreds of apps and conditions that can be used.
For promotional purposes, this can be a great way to automate a lot of the interaction aspect and save you some time.
Or you know, just use it to change your phone’s wallpaper each day!
33. Vuelio
Not a solution for everyone because, quite frankly, it’s a very pricey bit of kit, but Vuelio is pretty much the boss when it comes to a full PR software package.
If you’re doing any kind of outreach or influencer marketing, Vuelio will make your life easier.
It’s a combination of an extensive contact database and press release kit. If you’re looking for high end, top coverage in mainstream media or the best of niche media, Vuelio is perfect.
In this instance, counting the pennies might just be worth it.
**Bonus Resource
You may already be aware but we’ve also published a free resource, The Ultimate Content Promotion Guide & Checklist.
It’s our most comprehensive guide to date, in which we break down ALL the content promotion tactics, tricks and tools you’ll ever need.
Oh, and we’ve also crafted a handy printable checklist at the end of the guide so that you can always feel inspired and stay on track.
6. Measurement
34. Majestic
Although it’s typically used as a backlink or authority checker (hence us putting it in the measurement section), Majestic is so much more than that.
A great way that we use the tool at SiteVisibility, is to check out what our competitors are doing and see if we can replicate their success.
You can simply put in the URL of your competitors’ content and then straight away you are able to see a range of information including Trust Flow, Citation Flow, Link Profile, Backlinks and Anchor Text.
As mentioned, you’ll also be able to see the backlinks they’ve achieved, if you’re going out there to create a piece of content that’s even better, you’ll already have a list of sites to reach out to.
There are other tools that do the same, but Majestic SEO is quite simply one of the best.
35. Google Analytics
Simply put, Google Analytics is the most important measurement tool for any online campaign – Social, SEO, Content or otherwise.
To really get the most out of it though, everything needs to be set up correctly, and that can be tricky.
At SiteVisibility, we can actually help with this. Our team of experts can guide you or take care of the whole process for you.
You can check out our Measurement & Insight services here or contact us to find out more.
With that quick plug over, back to Google Analytics!
Within the platform, there are a wide range of ways in which you can have a look at how your content is performing.
For example, you can look at the number of page views, the amount of conversions it’s driving, the average bounce rate, the average time people are spending on the page, how many organic visits your content has had, plus a whole lot more.
If you haven’t got it set up already, what are you waiting for! It’s simply a must-have for every marketer.
36. Parse.ly
A measurement tool created specifically for content, Parse.ly is as you would expect, much more specialist than Google Analytics.
Parse.ly is really user friendly and is great at visualising how your content is performing, with a range of graphs and charts to help you.
Featuring aspects like sentiment analysis, sponsored content ROI analysis as well as almost all other content metrics you could ask for, Parse.ly is really a tool for those whose main concern is content i.e. media and publishing companies.
If you’ve got the budget, it’s definitely worth looking into.
37. Chartbeat
Like Parse.ly, Chartbeat is a specialist content measurement platform used by some of the world’s biggest publishers to analyse how their audiences are interacting with their content.
Again, if you’re not pushing out a lot of content on a regular basis, this may be a solution larger than is required, but as a market leader it’s worth including in this list.
38. Google Search Console
Google Search Console goes hand in hand with Google Analytics, but can often be more useful from a nuts and bolts perspective.
You want to make sure that there are no technical problems that are causing people to avoid or not engage with your content and Search Console allows you to do that.
Search console will help you identify broken links, 404s and multitude of other technical aspects that could contribute to a poor user experience.
You can also use it to see how your content is performing in search within the performance reports. You’re able to filter the data by certain URLs and then see things like click through rate, the average position in search results, clicks and impressions as well as the queries people have used to find your content.
With all of this information you can then prioritise and re-optimise your content to improve your performance.
39. Quintly
A specialist social media analytics tool, Quintly is another of the high-level measurement solutions that won’t be relevant for everyone, but issomething to which all content producers should consider aspiring.
Being able to track your social media performance alongside other content metrics is essential for improving content production moving forward, and Quintly is one of the best tools for this purpose.
If you have the budget and the need, it’s an ideal choice.
40. Cyfe
Combining all of the above into a simple package, yet for a relatively affordable price, is Cyfe.
It can be a completely integrated dashboard for everything from page views to sales to social shares to keyword rankings to company finances.
For those on a budget who want a simple but effective analytics solution, Cyfe could be just that.
Final thoughts
So, there you have it, 40 content marketing tools that could make your job easier.
Try one, a few or all of them and let us know your results.
Of course, if you have any other recommendations for our list, let us know. Why not leave a comment below or tweet us @SiteVisibility.
If we get enough suggestions, we might just keep updating this list for years to come!
To find out more about how SiteVisibility can help you with your Content Marketing email grow@sitevisibility.com, give us a call on 01273 733 433 or leave us a message via the contact form below:
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